The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest (The Millennium Trilogy #3)

Staff Pick

Picking up mere moments after the cliffhanger ending of The Girl Who Played with Fire, this final book in Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy brings the adventures of Salander and Blomkvist to a thunderous and satisfying conclusion.Recommended by Gerry, Powells.com

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

The stunning third and final novel in Stieg Larsson's internationally best-selling trilogy.

Lisbeth Salander — the heart of Larsson's two previous novels — lies in critical condition, a bullet wound to her head, in the intensive care unit of a Swedish city hospital. She's fighting for her life in more ways than one: if and when she recovers, she'll be taken back to Stockholm to stand trial for three murders. With the help of her friend, journalist Mikael Blomkvist, she will not only have to prove her innocence, but also identify and denounce those in authority who have allowed the vulnerable, like herself, to suffer abuse and violence. And, on her own, she will plot revenge — against the man who tried to kill her, and the corrupt government institutions that very nearly destroyed her life.

Once upon a time, she was a victim. Now Salander is fighting back.

Review:

"The exhilarating conclusion to bestseller Larsson's Millennium trilogy (after The Girl Who Played with Fire) finds Lisbeth Salander, the brilliant computer hacker who was shot in the head in the final pages of Fire, alive, though still the prime suspect in three murders in Stockholm. While she convalesces under armed guard, journalist Mikael Blomkvist works to unravel the decades-old coverup surrounding the man who shot Salander: her father, Alexander Zalachenko, a Soviet intelligence defector and longtime secret asset to Spo, Sweden's security police. Estranged throughout Fire, Blomkvist and Salander communicate primarily online, but their lack of physical interaction in no way diminishes the intensity of their unconventional relationship. Though Larsson (19542004) tends toward narrative excess, his was an undeniably powerful voice in crime fiction that will be sorely missed." 500,000 first printing. (May 2010)Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

Review:

"Salander is such a bravura heroine...that we'd willingly follow her through any bramble bush of a plot....There are few characters as formidable as Lisbeth Salander in contemporary fiction of any kind. She will be sorely missed." Booklist (starred review)

Review:

"Fans will not be disappointed: this is another roller-coaster ride that keeps you reading far too late into the night. Intricate but flawlessly plotted, it has complex characters as well as a satisfying, clear moral thrust." Evening Standard (U.K.)

Review:

"[The trilogy] is intricately plotted, lavishly detailed but written with a breakneck pace and verve....[Hornet's Nest] is a tantalizing double finale — first idyllic, then frenetic....Larsson has made the literary moods of saga and soap opera converge — with suspense as the adhesive." The Independent (U.K.)

Review:

"Larsson has produced a coup de foudre, a novel that is complex, satisfying, clever, moral....This is a grown-up novel for grown-up readers, who want something more than a quick fix and a car chase. And it's why the Millennium trilogy is rightly a publishing phenomenon all over the world." The Guardian (U.K.)

Review:

Review:

Synopsis:

The New York Times and # 1 international bestselling author Jussi Adler-Olsen returns with another shocking cold case in his exhilarating Department Q series.

Detective Carl M&oslash;rck holds in his hands a bottle that contains old and decayed message, written in blood. It is a cry for help from two young brothers, tied and bound in a boathouse by the sea. Could it be real? Who are these boys, and why werent they reported missing? Could they possibly still be alive?

Carls investigation will force him to cross paths with a woman stuck in a desperate marriage- her husband refuses to tell her where he goes, what he does, how long he will be away. For days on end she waits, and when he returns she must endure his wants, his moods, his threats. But enough is enough. She will find out the truth, no matter the cost to her husband—or to herself.

Carl and his colleagues Assad and Rose must use all of their resources to uncover the horrifying truth in this heart-pounding Nordic thriller from the #1 international bestselling author Jussi Adler-Olsen.

Video

About the Author

Stieg Larsson, who lived in Sweden, was the editor-in-chief of the magazine Expo and a leading expert on antidemocratic, right-wing extremist and Nazi organizations. He died in 2004, shortly after delivering the manuscripts for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire, and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest.

Luc, January 5, 2012 (view all comments by Luc)
This is my favorite read of 2011. The story is pitting an investigative journalist (Michael Blomkvist) and a talented computer hacker (Lisbeth Salander),who is also working on a contractual basis for a private security company, against a top secret swedish intelligence unit who answers to nobody but to the prime minister office. This unit was created solely to handle a soviet assassin who seeked refuge in Stockolm in the late 70s.

As Salander is fighting for her life and to clear her name in hospital, Blomkvist is immersing himself in one of the most dangerous assignment of his career. His task is to expose the link between the swedish intelligence community and a series of cover-ups to protect their soviet assassin, including the internment of Lisbeth Salander. This story is mainly about how far government operatives are willing to go in order to protect secrets that are deemed to be in the national security interest.

Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No(1 of 3 readers found this comment helpful)

Picking up mere moments after the cliffhanger ending of The Girl Who Played with Fire, this final book in Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy brings the adventures of Salander and Blomkvist to a thunderous and satisfying conclusion.

by Gerry

"Publishers Weekly Review"
by Publishers Weekly,
"The exhilarating conclusion to bestseller Larsson's Millennium trilogy (after The Girl Who Played with Fire) finds Lisbeth Salander, the brilliant computer hacker who was shot in the head in the final pages of Fire, alive, though still the prime suspect in three murders in Stockholm. While she convalesces under armed guard, journalist Mikael Blomkvist works to unravel the decades-old coverup surrounding the man who shot Salander: her father, Alexander Zalachenko, a Soviet intelligence defector and longtime secret asset to Spo, Sweden's security police. Estranged throughout Fire, Blomkvist and Salander communicate primarily online, but their lack of physical interaction in no way diminishes the intensity of their unconventional relationship. Though Larsson (19542004) tends toward narrative excess, his was an undeniably powerful voice in crime fiction that will be sorely missed." 500,000 first printing. (May 2010)Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"Review"
by Booklist (starred review),
"Salander is such a bravura heroine...that we'd willingly follow her through any bramble bush of a plot....There are few characters as formidable as Lisbeth Salander in contemporary fiction of any kind. She will be sorely missed."

"Review"
by Evening Standard (U.K.),
"Fans will not be disappointed: this is another roller-coaster ride that keeps you reading far too late into the night. Intricate but flawlessly plotted, it has complex characters as well as a satisfying, clear moral thrust."

"Review"
by The Independent (U.K.),
"[The trilogy] is intricately plotted, lavishly detailed but written with a breakneck pace and verve....[Hornet's Nest] is a tantalizing double finale — first idyllic, then frenetic....Larsson has made the literary moods of saga and soap opera converge — with suspense as the adhesive."

"Review"
by The Guardian (U.K.),
"Larsson has produced a coup de foudre, a novel that is complex, satisfying, clever, moral....This is a grown-up novel for grown-up readers, who want something more than a quick fix and a car chase. And it's why the Millennium trilogy is rightly a publishing phenomenon all over the world."

The New York Times and # 1 international bestselling author Jussi Adler-Olsen returns with another shocking cold case in his exhilarating Department Q series.

Detective Carl M&oslash;rck holds in his hands a bottle that contains old and decayed message, written in blood. It is a cry for help from two young brothers, tied and bound in a boathouse by the sea. Could it be real? Who are these boys, and why werent they reported missing? Could they possibly still be alive?

Carls investigation will force him to cross paths with a woman stuck in a desperate marriage- her husband refuses to tell her where he goes, what he does, how long he will be away. For days on end she waits, and when he returns she must endure his wants, his moods, his threats. But enough is enough. She will find out the truth, no matter the cost to her husband—or to herself.

Carl and his colleagues Assad and Rose must use all of their resources to uncover the horrifying truth in this heart-pounding Nordic thriller from the #1 international bestselling author Jussi Adler-Olsen.

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